While data reveal that fewer people are unlawfully crossing, more migrants are taking remote and dangerous routes in Arizona due to increased border security at safer crossing points in California and Texas, says Alicia Dinsmore, a volunteer with No More Deaths.

Since 2001, the remains of at least 2,832 migrants have been recovered in southern Arizona, according to the Arizona OpenGIS Initiative for Deceased Migrants. Before the start of the decade, fewer than five dead border crossers were found in Arizona each year; that number jumped to 79 in 2001.